


Rose's Gem

by theothernovelist



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Explicit Language, Gen, older steven
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-09
Updated: 2017-03-09
Packaged: 2018-10-01 12:54:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10190327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theothernovelist/pseuds/theothernovelist
Summary: A (sort of?) deadly encounter with some gem monsters brings fear, uncertainty, and changes for Steven and his family.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is technically just the first chapter, but it kind of manages to stand on its own. The rest/more will be up soon. I'm not sure how long it's going to be overall.

            “Steven, what the fuck?” Amethyst said, throwing at him a half-empty bag of Doritos that she’d explicitly told him not to eat.

 

            “Amethyst!” Pearl scolded, more by force of habit than anything. “Language!”

 

            “Yeah, Amethyst,” Steven said, chuckling. “I’m only sixteen, don’t fucking swear in front of me.” Amethyst burst out laughing and Pearl rolled her eyes, but couldn’t help smiling. Especially seeing the way Steven was blushing; grown as he was, he still didn’t usually talk that way.

 

            “I didn’t even eat them, anyway,” Steven said, throwing the bag of now mostly-broken chips back at Amethyst. “It was probably Peridot. Maybe even Ruby. She does that sometimes, you know.”

 

            “Bull,” Amethyst said, shaking her head.

           

            “It was Ruby,” Garnet said, emerging from the temple with a sigh and an eye roll. “Sapphire had to talk to Blue Diamond, and…” She paused, as though she’d just heard something. She had heard something. “Did you hear that?” she said to no one in particular.

           

            “Yes,” said Pearl, exasperated.

 

            “I hear them, too,” Steven said as Amethyst groaned in agreement. “It sounds like there’s a million of them.”

 

            They were talking about the gem shard monsters they’d been fighting almost nonstop for the last week or so. They were in all different colors, but all basically looked (and sounded) like mosquitoes the size of minivans. They all went over to the window to look out, and sure enough a sizeable horde of the things was descending upon their beach.

 

            “This shit is getting old,” Amethyst said, drawing her whip dramatically. “The usual?”

 

            “The usual,” confirmed Garnet, and the Crystal Gems jumped together down to the beach.

 

            There weren’t _quite_ a million gemsquitoes (as Amethyst less-than-affectionately called them) as Steven had predicted, but there were certainly more of them than there had been at once so far, and the team found themselves struggling. Even on Lion’s back, Steven was having trouble moving quickly enough to protect himself, much less actually subdue any of the creatures. One particularly aggressive one kept flying right at his face, so he focused his attention on that one, keeping his shield to his back. _This would be so much easier for Stevonnie_ , he thought. If only Connie didn’t have to go to school all the time. Even on his own, though, he was able to corner the gemsquito near the base of the cliff. All he had to do was poof it and bubble it, then it’d live safely in the temple until he could figure out how to heal it. _If_ he could figure out how to heal it.

 

            “Steven, look—“ Pearl’s voice shouted from somewhere behind him. But Steven never heard the end of the sentence, never knew what to look out for. He felt a sudden gust of wind behind him, and everything went black.

 

            “Steven!” Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl shouted in unison as one of the smaller gem monsters slammed into their boy’s back, throwing him off Lion and into the stony wall of the cliff in front of him. There was a sickening crack as his head hit the rocks. Suddenly afraid and desperate, they formed Alexandrite and made relatively quick work of the creatures. The fusion had been rushed and unstable, and they all came out of it exhausted, but that didn’t matter now. Lion stood huddled over Steven, listless and bloodied on the sand. The big cat only moved aside when the Gems knelt next to him.

 

            “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god…” Amethyst repeated over and over, pulling on her hair. “He’s dead, he’s fucking dead…”

 

            “Steven?” Pearl asked desperately, already having conjured a handkerchief from somewhere and begun to wipe the blood from the child’s forehead. Garnet reached down and put her hand on his neck, just to the side of his chin, like she’d seen humans do when checking if other humans were dead. She’d never had to try it herself thus far, and was not particularly enjoying it. She felt nothing at first, but after several seconds (which seemed, at the time, like an hour) she detected a faint flutter of a pulse. Steven’s telepathic abilities had begun to diminish as he aged, but Garnet tried anyway, looking for any sign of his consciousness, with mild success; she could feel him, but she couldn’t find him.

 

            “I think he’s alive,” she said suddenly, putting an abrupt stop to Amethyst and Pearl’s raving and muttering. “I mean—I know he is.” She’d suddenly realized what was going on. “He’s regenerating. He can’t poof—he’s got a physical body. So I think this is the next best thing.”

 

            “We need to get him inside,” Pearl said, lucid again with her wits about her. “He’s starting to get cold.”

 

 

           

            _Wait…where am I?_ thought Steven. He couldn’t remember where he was supposed to be, but he was pretty sure wherever he was standing now wasn’t it. He’d certainly never been here before, but there was something familiar about it, anyway. He racked his brain for a minute, trying to stir up whatever memory was trying to make a connection to reality right now, but it was hard. He had a headache.

            _Lion’s mane!_ he thought suddenly. Wherever he was, it was really similar to being inside Lion’s mane. He took a deep breath, then sighed. Okay. Not Lion’s mane. Can’t breathe in there.

 

            He took a few steps, turned himself around and around, just looking. Another place occurred to him; his mom’s—er, his—room in the temple.

 

            “I want a door out of here,” he said out loud, into the pale pink void. Nothing happened. So it wasn’t like the room. “Think, Steven, think,” he said, sitting down on the endless floor. He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. Suddenly, he felt something touching his hand. Startled, he opened his eyes. Nothing was there. He closed his eyes again tried to think, but just kept zoning out, as though he were falling asleep. He felt the touch on his hand again, and soon realized that even though he’d been running his hands through his own hair, he couldn’t feel his hair. He felt the sheets on his bed touching the back of his hand, the bed still cool to the touch. He felt another hand in his. Connie’s hand, small and warm. He heard voices, but couldn’t make out any words; it was like he was listening to someone speak underwater. He heard Pearl’s voice, and his father’s. He heard someone crying—no, two people crying. Amethyst and Connie. _Stop crying_ , he tried to say, but no sound came out. _I’m okay, I’m right here._ Memories came flooding back to him all of a sudden—the battle, the monsters, the cliff. But…what did that have to do with…whatever this was? He tried to move, but couldn’t. He was lying in bed, but he couldn’t sit up. He could hear his family talking, but couldn’t say anything. He opened his eyes.

 

            Back in the pink void. He could move, he could breathe, he could speak. He closed his eyes again, just for a second, but he couldn’t manage to…what exactly was it he couldn’t do? He…couldn’t find his body again. _What to do, what to do?_ he thought, rocking himself back and forth a little and twiddling his thumbs. _I’m stuck…somewhere. I have to wake up, but I can’t_. He stood up and started pacing again.

 

            “Steven?” said a voice, which stopped him in his tracks. This voice wasn’t muddled and distant, like he’d heard a moment ago. It was a familiar voice, but he’d never heard it before. Not in real life, anyway. Not really. But it was real this time. He knew it was. “Steven, is that you?”

 

            He turned slowly, continuing to stare at the floor. He wrung his hands, trying to stop them from shaking so much. Then, taking a deep breath, he looked up. And there she was, looking every bit as confused and scared and happy and sad as he felt.

 

            “Mom?”


End file.
